Second Grade
Worksheets
Gertrude Chandler Warner
Kids like reading when it is fun. If a story is boring, reading can be a chore. A good story can make reading a pleasure. The Boxcar Children series has made reading fun for kids for many years. Did you know that once people thought the books were too much fun? The kids in the stories had no parents. Still, they stuck together and ended up having a lot of fun. When the books were first published, librarians didn't think that kids should be having so much fun with no parents around!
The Boxcar Children series was written by Gertrude Chandler Warner. She was born in 1890. She lived in a house near a train station. She liked playing with dolls. She also loved to read and write. She was five years old when she began dreaming about being a writer. She had a lot of time to read and practice writing. She was sick a lot as a girl. She spent a lot of time in bed with nothing else to do but read or write. Each year, her mother gave her a notebook. It was for her to write her stories in. When she was nine, she wrote her first book. She also illustrated it. She made the book for her grandfather. It was his Christmas gift. Her sister made a book for him, too. After that, they each gave their grandparents a new book every year.
Ms. Warner was sick so often when she was younger that she didn't get to finish school. In 1918, World War I started. At that time, most teachers were men. They were needed to fight in the war. Someone had to teach the children. The school board asked Ms. Warner to teach first grade. They chose her because she taught Sunday school at her church. They didn't care that she hadn't finished school. They needed help quickly! She accepted the job. It wasn't easy. She had eighty students! She had forty students in the morning. In the afternoon she had forty more. She learned more and more about teaching each year. She even kept teaching when the war was over. She taught in the same classroom for thirty-two years!
